Staff & Board

SECTION27’s Board of Directors is made up of the following distinguished people:

Vuyiseka Dubula is the General Secretary of TAC having been elected in 2008 and has been an active TAC member since 2001. In 2002 Vuyiseka began working as a TAC treatment literacy coordinator in the Western Cape, and showed great courage, passion and zeal for TAC programmes and its branches. She is living openly with HIV and is committed to ensuring that woman and girls have access to health services and live equally in society free of gender and sexual violence.

She has worked with Medicines Sans Frontieres, has spoken at numerous International forums and was awarded the Courageous Leaders Award by the University of Olso in 2003. She was a recipient of the British Chevening Leadership programme in 2009, is a representative of People living with HIV in the South African National AIDS Council, the Chairperson of the ALP, an advisor to UNAIDS and was this year’s co-recipient of the John. M. Lloyd Foundation Leadership in HIV award in Los Angeles.

During his 25 years at the Johannesburg Bar Johann Kriegler, serving as chairman several times, co-founded the Legal Resources Centre and Lawyers for Human Rights. Subsequently, after 10 years as a provincial and appellate judge, he was appointed a founder justice of the new Constitutional Court.

Both when on the Bench and since his retirement he has kept up his involvement with certain NGOs, notably the Pretoria University Centre for Human Rights, Project Literacy, the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund and latterly Freedom Under Law. Over the last decade he has conducted judicial, electoral and human rights missions in some 30 hot spots around the world, recently heading the international enquiry into the failed Kenyan elections of December 2007.

He has been an ALP board member since its foundation in 2006 and will continue on the Section 27 board.

Nhlanhla Ndlovu is a programme manager at the Centre for Economic Governance and AIDS in Africa (CEGAA), responsible for a Parliamentary and Civil Society Programme. He joined CEGAA in October 2008 after serving as a Provincial Manager of KZN Child Services programme for ARK (Absolute Return for Kids), where he promoted access to social security as an intervention in mitigating the social impact of AIDS. He spent years working for IDASA’s AIDS Budget Unit where he monitored resource allocation and utilisation for HIV and AIDS funds in South Africa. His HIV and AIDS experience includes numerous research positions, such as work on Informed Consent procedures in HIV vaccine development research, and monitoring and evaluation of community and government responses to HIV and AIDS.

He holds a Master of Philosophy in Public Policy (UCT), Honours in Commerce (UKZN) and Bachelor’s Degree in Social Sciences (UKZN). He has also worked as an academic lecturing on Business Administration and Industrial Psychology.
He is a member of the following:
Treasurer of the Board of Directors for the AIDS Law Project (ALP) Member of the Board of Trustees for the Centre for Economic Governance and AIDS in Africa (CEGAA)

Quarraisha Abdool Karim, PhD, is an infectious diseases epidemiologist whose main current research interests are in understanding the evolving HIV epidemic in South Africa; factors influencing acquisition of HIV infection in adolescent girls; and sustainable strategies to introduce and scale up new HIV interventions in resource-constrained settings. She is an Associate Professor in Epidemiology at the Mailman School of Public Health and in Public Health and Family Medicine at the Nelson R. Mandela School of Medicine, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.

Since 1998 she has played a central role in building the science base in southern Africa through the Columbia University – Southern African Fogarty AIDS International Training and Research Programme and is also an Associate Scientific Director of the Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research in South Africa (CAPRISA). She is currently co-chair of the HIV Prevention Trials Network, a large NIH funded network that sets and undertakes key HIV prevention research globally.

Prof. Sharon Fonn has been Head of the School of Public Health, University of the Witwatersrand since 2003. She is a medical doctor, and registered public health specialist and holds a PhD. Over the past two decades she has received several grants to address public health training and research, including institution strengthening, in South Africa and regionally. Sharon has over 50 publications and has published more than 20 technical reports and has published curriculum for training in health including two published by the World Health Organisation. Her work on cervical cancer and a national cancer control programme for South Africa is well-documented. She has also been invited to teach and develop curriculum in a number of countries including India and for the World Bank.

Prof Fonn was awarded the Ministry of Science and Technology’s Distinguished Scientist Award for contributions to the quality of life of women (2005), has been a member of the Academy of Science of South Africa since 2004 and is a Woodrow Wilson Centre Scholar. She serves on several national and international boards, is involved in international and United Nations initiatives and is a member of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council.

See below.

Marius Pieterse is a professor of law and assistant dean of research in the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management at the University of the Witwatersrand, where he teaches constitutional law and human rights law. His research focuses mainly on health and human rights, and he has published widely in the field.

Theodora Steele was elected as a shopsteward in 1985, for the then Garment Allied Workers Union (GAWU). She later participated in the clothing wage negotiations and the merger talks between GAWU and ACTWUSA that led to the formation of South African Clothing and Textile Workers Union (SACTWU).

In 1990, she was elected the 2^nd Vice President of SACTWU and served in the Clothing Bargaining Council and later became an organizer in Durban. In 1995, she became the Branch Secretary in Johannesburg and was later seconded to the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) to coordinate the Recruitment Campaign. She is currently the National Organising Secretary of COSATU.

Steele has been involved in the fight against HIV/AIDS since 1999. She coordinated COSATU HIV and AIDS campaigns and programmes and went on to represent labour in the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) and eventually served in the National Council of TAC. She also coordinated joint campaigns around the PMA court case, PMTCT court case and submissions to the Competition Commission on excessive pricing. She has served on the ALP Board since 2006.

SECTION27 has the following staff members:

Muhammad began his career as an accounting clerk at Harron Takolia & Co., a registered firm of auditors and accountants. In 2002 he successfully completed his Commercial and Financial Accountants (CFA) articles. During this period he gained vast experience with non-governmental organisations. He worked in the motor industry before joining the ALP in 2006.

Jonathan joined the ALP as a researcher in 2002 and is now a senior researcher and director of policy and research at SECTION27. After serving as the legal education and advice officer at the National Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality from 1997 to 1999, he clerked for Justice Catherine O’Regan of the Constitutional Court. He holds degrees in architecture and law from the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, as well as a Master of Laws degree from the University of Toronto that focused on the relationship between access to treatment for HIV/AIDS, international trade law and domestic Constitutional law.

Jonathan has been a member of the Medicines Control Council since June 2009, and was appointed to the board of governors of Holy Family College – an independent school – in early 2010. He is also an honorary research fellow at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, where he co-teaches courses on HIV/AIDS & the Law and Medicines, Rights & Regulation. Until late 2007, Jonathan chaired the board of the Lesbian and Gay Equality Project, where he was integrally involved in the successful Constitutional challenge to the exclusion of same-sex couples from the marriage laws of South Africa.

Publications by Jonathan Berger

Daygan joined SECTION27 in 2011 as a researcher and coordinator of BEMF. He grew up in Johannesburg but spent seven years studying and working in Grahamstown before returning to Johannesburg to join the organisation. He has a degree in Psychology and a BA (Hon) in Social Anthropology. He is studying towards a Postgraduate Diploma in Health Economics through UCT, and plans to finish his MA thesis on transformation in the South African Police Service.

Daygan has experience in monitoring and evaluating budget and public resource management processes for public health care at the provincial level and is currently responsible for integrating this area of work into SECTION27’s work on the right to health. He is also responsible for coordinating the BEMF, which is a coalition of civil society organisations that monitors the funding and implementation of national strategic plans on HIV/AIDS and TB.

Adila joined the ALP in 2004 and was the head of litigation and legal services from 2006 until 2010. She has a BA LLB from the former University of Natal, Durban. In 1998 she was awarded the Franklin Thomas Fellowship to pursue an LLM at St Louis University, which she completed with distinction in 1999. In 2000 she was awarded the Rev Lewers – Bradlow Foundation Fellowship to pursue her doctorate at the University of Notre Dame. The doctorate was conferred on her with honours in 2006. Her dissertation was entitled “The protection of social rights in South Africa: from theory to practice”.

Adila is a member of the Johannesburg Bar and an honorary research fellow at the School of Law of the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. Most recently Adila has been appointed to the technical advisory group of the Global Commission on HIV and Law. A former law clerk to the Deputy Chief Justice Pius Langa, as well as then Acting Justice Edwin Cameron, Adila has continued passionately to defend constitutional rights, and socio-economic rights in particular.

Publications by Adila Hassim

Mark grew up in Nigeria, Ghana, Botswana and England. He holds a BA (Hons) in English Language and Literature from Balliol College, Oxford University. After graduating from Oxford in 1986 he worked for the Marxist Workers Tendency of the ANC, first in London and then from 1989 to 1994 in South Africa. During this time he was instrumental in setting up campaigns such as the Philemon Mauku Defence Campaign, the Leeukop Political Prisoners Support Committee and the Johannesburg Inner City Community Forum. He also did an MA in African literature at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and lectured and wrote on the influences of Shakespeare on African writing and politics in South Africa.

Mark joined the ALP in 1994, becoming its head in 1997 and executive director in 2006. In 1998, he was one of the founders of the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC). In 2007, he was elected as deputy chairperson of the South African National AIDS Council. He is also the current chairperson of the UNAIDS Reference Group on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights. In 2009, Mark was appointed as a member of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on National Health Insurance.

Mark has written extensively on HIV, human rights and the law, including co-editing the AIDS and the Law Resource Manual and Health & Democracy: A guide to human rights, health law and policy in post-Apartheid South Africa. He has been part of the legal teams of the ALP and TAC that have been involved in all the major litigation around HIV and human rights.

Publications by Mark Heywood

Metumo obtained a B Juris from the University of Namibia in 2007 and an LLB from UCT in 2010. As a student, Metumo was involved in several student organisations.  These include SLSJ and LAWCO.  Metumo joined SECTION27 in 2011. He was appointed as the first fellow under the SECTION27 – SLSJ Graduate Fellowship Programme, which will see him spend a year at SECTION27 as a researcher.

Nonkosi is a former teacher at St Lewis Bertrand’s High School and tutor at the then University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg. She began working at the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) in 2001 as the organisation’s executive secretary. Shortly after she served as the National Women’s Health Programs Coordinator where her focus was on evaluating programmes for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV and the availability of post-exposure prophylaxis for rape survivors. In 2004, Nonkosi was promoted to lead TAC’s Treatment Project.

Nonkosi was elected as TAC chairperson in 2008 and has continued to represent TAC on international and national stages. She served as an executive member of the University of Natal’s Movement Against Women Abuse.She was this year’s co-recipient of the John M. Lloyd Foundation Leadership in HIV award in Los Angeles.

Varsha completed her undergraduate degree in Political Science and Law at the University of KwaZulu Natal (UKZN). She went on to do her Honours and Master’s degrees in Political and International Studies at Rhodes University. Her MA thesis was an exploration of the experiences and ethnic identities of Indian South African Umkhonto we Sizwe members.

Varsha worked as a tutor and teaching assistant at Rhodes University. She was also on the steering committee of Growing Women Leaders at UKZN and has worked and volunteered at a number of animal rights organisations.

Maphumulo has spent a large part of his life fighting for and defending human rights. He began as a student leader and activist. His legal career began at Werksmans Attorneys where he was a candidate attorney. He practiced independently as a general practitioner before joining the Competition Commission as an investigator in its Enforcement and Exemptions Division, and ultimately as legal counsel. At the Commission he championed the rights of workers and was elected shop-steward and union branch chairperson.

S’khumbuzo joined the ALP in January 2008 as an attorney and has already been the attorney of record in a number of landmark cases. He currently serves on the steering committee of the Rural Health Advocacy Project, a partnership between the Wits Centre for Rural Health, the Rural Doctors Association of Southern Africa and SECTION27. He holds a BA in law and an LLB from the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and was admitted as an attorney of the High Court in 2003.

Phindile has worked as a salesperson for numerous shops in the city centre. In 2000, she received a home-based care certificate because of her interest in assisting people within the community. She joined the ALP in June 2006 as an office assistant.

Kate obtained a BA (Hons) in Law and Political & International Studies from Rhodes University. Half of her honours year was spent at the University of Leicester in the United Kingdom, where she completed a master’s course on the core principles of human rights.

During her years at Rhodes she had extensive involvement in community projects, including teaching at the Amasango Career School in Grahamstown, sitting on the committee of Rhodes’ major fundraising campaign, and working for the Legal Activism society in its first year of operation.

She plans to leave SECTION27 in February 2011 to complete her LLB at Wits.

Umunyana commenced work as an attorney at SECTION27 in April 2010. Her areas of work include access to health care services in the private sector, access to social security, and related social justice issues. Prior to joining SECTION27, Umunyana practised public interest law before focusing on employment law and general commercial litigation at Webber Wentzel Attorneys. She was also a research clerk at the International Criminal Court in The Hague during 2008.

Umunyana holds an LLB from the University of Cape Town, as well as a BA in environmental studies from the State University of New York at Buffalo and an MA in environmental management from Cornell University.

She began her career as an HR Consultant at Pontshano Consulting and became a Personal Assistant/Legal Secretary to a number of Partners and Associates at Dewey & Lebouef. She was then appointed as the Office Assistant at Oteo Capital. She joined the AIDS Law Project in March 2010 and is in charge of the Resources Centre, Procurement and general office administration. Seboko completed a year-long course in Public Management at Pretoria Technikon and is currently completing a BSc IT at UNISA.

Nasser spent five years as a Divisional Accountant at Mercantile Bank Asset Finance and was an Accountant at Golden Glow Textiles. He was then self-employed in the fast food industry afterwhich he joined the AIDS Law Project in as the financial officer.

He is currently studying towards a BCompt Degree at UNISA.

Agnieszka obtained an LLB from the University of Pretoria, where she participated in many student structures, including serving on the Student Representative Council and as a Student Court judge. After completing her studies she worked at the South African Human Rights Commission as a researcher, and then at the Constitutional Court as a research clerk, before joining Webber Wentzel Attorneys (WW). Agnieszka completed her articles and then practised as an associate in WW’s litigation department.

Agnieszka commenced work at the ALP in May 2008. Her interests lie in human rights, and in particular the realisation of socio economic rights. At SECTION27, she works on issues such as access to health care services, health policy, budgeting for health and human rights related to TB and drug-resistant TB. She is also currently working with other civil society organisations in a legal challenge to loitering by-laws, in terms of which some 350 homeless people were arrested outside the Central Methodist Mission in Johannesburg in July 2008